It’s been a long time coming but Virginia duo Clipse, who last hit us with their 2003 debut ‘Lord Willin’’, have finally come in from the streets after years of label merry-go-rounds. Now, with their own label Re-Up Gang, Pusha T and Malice are at last able to ’fess up with an album ‘niece high’ in cocaine.
It follows Ghostface Killah’s tribute to Luca (as in Gianluca Vialli), ‘Fishscale’ – so addictive that he’s back with ‘More Fish’ later this year – and Young Jeezy’s ‘The Inspiration: Thug Motivation 102’. But Pusha T and Malice reveal more than just the ill-gotten gains of selling coca. Their sharp, surreal wordplay, notably on the unsettling, steel pan-assisted ‘Wamp Wamp’, sits next to rhymes that deal in the paranoia and shame (‘I’m so obnoxious/My only accomplice my conscience’, from ‘Momma I’m So Sorry’) that comes with bagging up. These rolling lines are coupled with the best production in some time from The Neptunes. Back on form, they’ve crafted a sparse, bleak and futuristic electro landscape that suits well the guilt-ridden ‘Nightmares’, Wu-like aggression of ‘Trill’ and the slinky ‘Mr Me Too’. And, incredibly for a modern-day hip hop album, especially one where there’s so much snow flying about, it’s almost perfectly concise.
